


Come Up For Air

by Flightless_Bird



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Futures, Angst, Implied Character Death, Infinity War, Panic, Pre-Relationship, Protective Tony Stark, Realization of Feelings, Taunting, Violence, battle on titan, i wrote this battle scene as best i could
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-22
Updated: 2019-04-22
Packaged: 2020-01-24 00:59:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18560692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flightless_Bird/pseuds/Flightless_Bird
Summary: “He remembered how those eyes blazed when Tony had blasted him from Thanos’ hold. Don’t touch him. Stephen wasn’t sure if he was hearing the echoes of Tony’s words from the alternate future, or if they were entirely his own.”In which Dr. Strange sees another future that shifts his thoughts on Tony Stark.





	Come Up For Air

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently, I enjoy pain.   
> I just wanted to explore a little of these characters’ feelings showing in battle, and of course, Stephen’s beginnings of feelings for Tony from the alternate realities.   
> Thank you for reading! Leave a word or two if you enjoyed :3

Stephen knew that he only had one shot at this. Let Thanos get close, wear him down, then expand a portal around his arm to sever off the gauntlet. That was the plan, that was what he had seen, and what would win this. The only problem: getting close to Thanos. He had to be close enough to make sure the portal opened correctly, and to close it in time before he moved. They couldn’t risk shaky aim or hurried actions. It had to be timed perfectly.

The others were doing well. It was coming together: Peter’s webbing thick around the gauntlet, Tony at the other side, brave Mantis atop Thanos’ shoulders. Her fingertips pressed to his temples, face screwed up in concentration. Thanos’ rigid form shook, the effort of trying to wrench himself out of their grasp sending trembles along Peter’s web. Quill was helping him, holding onto one of Peter’s mechanical legs with a gun trained on Thanos’ face. From his place with reinforced hand armor locked around Thanos’ free arm, Tony’s feet began to dig furrows into the ground. Thanos choked out a strangled yell and Mantis groaned with it, clutching his head.

“I can't hold him much longer!” she gasped. “He is strong!”

Tony’s feet left the ground entirely as his rockets fired, adding even more strain to his side. “Get in here, Strange!”

“Hold him!” Stephen strode forward, arm already circling. When he was within a yard of Thanos, threads of sparking orange began to loop around the gauntlet, just above where flesh turned to metal. It was working, it was opening, they were—

Someone off to the right said something unintelligible to Quill. Whatever it was, it made him jerk around with a choked, “ _what_?!”

Stephen ignored it, focusing on the landscape glowing into existence behind the portal. So close.

“You son of a _bitch_!”

Peter then, desperate and broken: “ _Wait, no!!”_

Quill pulled the trigger. The gunshot echoed across Titan, a ball of fire streaking past Thanos’ head and catching on his shoulder. His body pitched to the right, throwing off Mantis’ focus as she lost her balance. “No!”

Returning to consciousness like a bullet, Thanos roared his fury. In one motion, he sent Mantis flying with a heave of his shoulders and tore his arm free of Peter’s hold. The gauntlet flashed out of the snapping portal—and locked around Stephen’s throat. Choking off his air, Stephen instinctively clung to the hulking fingers around his neck, a slow sense of panic sinking into his lungs. They weren't going to win.

Dimly, he was aware of Quill, missing, thrown somewhere, and Peter racing to retrieve him and Mantis. Through his ragged breaths, Thanos’ lips edged toward a smile. “The Stone,” he commanded, softly, like this was his private moment of triumph over Stephen Strange. A weak flare of anger make Stephen glare over the arm ending his life. “Now, or I’ll take it from your corpse,” Thanos added. The grip tightened and Stephen’s vision went fuzzy.

Suddenly, a metallic thump against the ground and a telltale, electric keen sounded from the left: Iron Man’s hand extended and searing. “Don't _touch_ him!” Tony snarled, and the world went temporarily white as he fired.

It met Thanos like a rocket, but he only staggered with a grunt. However, it was enough for his hold to loosen around Stephen. The cloak immediately snapped around him and flung him backward, out of impact range. Stephen gasped for air, that panic still building, even as he was pulled farther away. Too far, too far, too far. “ _Wait_ ,” he rasped to the cloak, scrabbling for purchase in the sandy ground. He couldn't get back in time, he couldn't—

He had to watch as Thanos turned on Tony, something akin to fierce annoyance written across his features. Tony had an arm outstretched to fire again, and Thanos clasped the gauntlet over it. There was a sickening crunch of metal and bone, and Tony swore. The armor of his free hand morphed into a small battering ram and he sent it crashing into the side of Thanos’ head. Thanos _laughed_. The sound shot its way straight through Stephen’s chest and he struggled again to get up. His legs were unsteady, wooziness still swimming in his mind. He lifted one trembling hand, but only succeeded in producing a spit of sparks before he collapsed again. “Get me up,” he pleaded to the cloak, which seemed to be shaking its collar around him in a firm no. “I don’t care if I’m hurt, _get me up.”_

He heard the exploding screech of Thanos ripping the ram from Tony’s arm, taking crackling chunks of armor with it. Both arms out of commission—and Tony still fought back. Stephen saw the rockets in his feet light up, but he never got off the ground. Thanos’ fingers dented the suit’s exterior as he dug them into the helmet and tore it from Tony’s head. The cold dread and determination mingling in his eyes, his tensed jaw, it clenched around Stephen’s heart in a way he hadn’t expected. He knew with sickening clarity that Tony was going to go down fighting.

And he did.

He had a millisecond to raise the mangled armor remaining on one of his arms, part of it functioning enough to form a blade. Thanos caught it in one hand with a bang—then, in one, decisive streak of the gauntlet, seized the Arc Reactor. His fingers split through the suit with a harsh flex, the exact moment of pressure known in the startled sound that ripped out of Tony’s throat.

The panic was _blinding_. “Stop, wait—!” Before he knew what he was doing, Stephen reached up, stretching for the gleam of the Time Stone.

At the sound of his voice, Tony’s gaze flicked over to him, met his. Minutely, he shook his head: _don’t you dare_.

“You’ve been a worthy opponent, Tony Stark,” Thanos told him, looking with interest at the hands locked tight around his wrist, the one holding Tony’s heart in his palm. “I’ll remember you, as will the survivors of my balance.”

“Fuck you,” Tony shot back in his battle-ripped voice.

Thanos smiled pityingly. “A shame you won’t survive to see what I created.” His grip around the Reactor tightened, sadistically slow, and Tony wheezed.

The cloak still tugged at Stephen’s arms, trying to keep him from getting up, from straining too much. _Shut up_! Stephen clambered up to his feet, anyway, stumbled, dropped to one knee. Wincing, he raised an arm, outstretched toward Tony.

Tony looked at him again, the side of his mouth quirking up in an expression close to weary acceptance. “Stephen,” he said, the weight behind the word screaming, _take care of them._

And then Thanos’ arm was ripping back and—

 

Stephen jolted back to the present like a drowning man coming up for air.

Reality crashed into him, the circle of Quill, Drax—a stab of pain, Drax hadn’t made it too far in that future—Mantis, a couple feet away, speaking. Peter close by, jumping at the sorcerer’s sudden return to consciousness. Tony turning suddenly to face him, brow furrowed. “What was that?” he demanded, voice short and strong, and alive. The Arc Reactor glowed steadily at his chest.

Stephen shuddered from head to toe, recalling the steel scream of Tony’s suit being destroyed. “Ah.” Pausing, he gathered himself. “Using the Time Stone to look at every possible outcome of our battle with Thanos.”

Guarded interest flickered over Tony’s face. Beside him, Peter stood from where’d he been perched cross-legged on fallen rubble. “Uh, do we have good chances…?” he ventured, eyes flitting from Tony to Stephen and back again.

Stephen didn’t answer for a moment. He was stuck in the warm brown of Tony’s eyes, the resolve burning there. He remembered how those eyes blazed when Tony had blasted him from Thanos’ hold. _Don’t touch him_. Stephen wasn’t sure if he was hearing the echoes of Tony’s words from the alternate future, or if they were entirely his own.

“Hey, Doc, if we’re that screwed, just say it,” Tony said, snapping his fingers, and Stephen started.

“No, no, we’re not,” he answered, exhaling shakily. “I mean, we are, but…there’s a one percent chance of us winning.” _Of you living,_ he added in silence.

Tony rolled his eyes with a huffed sigh. “Astonishing motivation skills, wizard.”

“Sorcerer,” Stephen corrected absently.

But he found that he still had the capacity to smile.


End file.
